Challenges ahead for hospitality sector

SHANGHAI: China's hospitality industry represents tremendous potential but may face a number of challenges, a group of chief executive officers and industry watchers said on Monday at the 17th CEO roundtable, with the theme "Hotel and Tourism Development in China," organized by China Daily.

The most-cited challenges at the roundtable included talent recruitment and retention, inadequacy of infrastructure and a lack of travel-related policy support.

Facts and figures

"I believe that China is addressing a number of the issues we are talking about," said Christopher Bachran, president of Jin Jiang International Hotel Management Co Ltd and the honorary chairman of the roundtable.

In the mid-1980s, the international hospitality market was brand new in China with Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou as the primary locations, Bachran said.

Two decades later, in 2004, the revenue generated by China's tourism industry was estimated at 289.2 billion yuan (US$35.6 billion), accounting for 2.3 per cent of the country's gross domestic product, according to the World Travel and Tourism Council (WTTC).

In the same year, 109 million overseas tourists came to China, an increase of 19 per cent from 2003, and the number of Chinese travelling overseas was estimated at 28.85 million, an increase of 42.7 per cent, official statistics show.

The WTTC predicts that China will be the world's fourth-largest tourism market in the years to come.

The Beijing Olympics in 2008 and Shanghai's World Expo in 2010 are expected to bring even more impetus to China's hospitality industry, Bachran said.

Given the tremendous potential, the American Chamber of Commerce recently formed a travel and tourism committee to look at aspects of the market that need to be addressed, he said.

A common topic of discussion was how to do more business particularly at weekends, said John Northen, general manager of JW Marriott Hotel Shanghai & Marriott Executive Apartments.

"What we need to do is to look at ways to improve existing facilities that are available right now and people's awareness of those," Northen said.

Another common topic of discussion was airports, specifically delays in international arrivals of up to two hours in getting through customs.

"I know physically there are some challenges there, but I think still there can be an improvement in the human aspect of the service," Northen said.

To help the hotel industry grow, Ralph Grippo, vice-president and area general manager of the Portman Ritz-Carlton Shanghai, thinks it needs more people.